Since Tuesday, the streets of Bogotá, Cali and Medellin have been agitated by demonstrations marked by violence.
The toll is heavy: 11 dead, 248 wounded including 58 by firearms.
It was the death of a lawyer in a police station on the night of Tuesday to Wednesday that ignited the powder, and especially the dissemination of images of his arrest.
It shows helmeted bikers of the Colombian police for 2 minutes holding down Javier Ordonez, a 46-year-old engineer currently studying law to become a lawyer, and administering a series of electric shocks to him.
They then took him to the Villaluz police station (CAI) in the Enbativa district.
He was pronounced dead a few hours later in hospital.
Read also: Colombia: Claudia Lopez, the new mayor of Bogotá, "a different woman"
The lawyer was participating in protests directed against the policies of President Iván Duque, a close friend of former President Álvaro Uribe.
Since coming to power in 2018, the country's security situation has deteriorated significantly.
The peace agreements with his predecessor Juan Manuel Santos with the Farc guerrillas provided for the reinvestment of the State in areas previously held by the Farc.
But President Duque's opposition to these agreements slowed down the implementation of the peace plan, leaving the ground open to dissidents from the Facs, the ELN (the last Colombian guerrilla) and armed groups, heirs of the paramilitaries.
The assassinations of social activists and massacres have increased since the coming to power of Iván Duque.
According to Ideas para la paz, 41 massacres have taken place in the country, killing 210 people since 2018.
Read also: Colombia: where is the peace process with the Farc?
The mayor of Bogotá, Claudia Lopez, denounced "
a massacre against young people in recent days
".
She notes that "
there is solid evidence that in at least four places (in the Colombian capital) firearms have been used by members of the police against the lives of our young people
."
The Minister of Defense, Carlos Holmes Trujillo, described the events to him as vandalism in which 93 police officers were injured, 56 police stations attacked, 22 of which were set on fire.
For his part, former president Álvaro Uribe called on the government to declare a state of siege, to bring in “
the army with the tanks… and to kick out the foreign vandals
”.
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